Adobe Summit: Helping You ‘Make Experience Your Business’

How well does the customer experience for your brand match what you want it to be? If you are like the rest of us, there is a gap, and it is not easy to fix. I meet with hundreds of companies a year, and each one has a unique angle on these challenges. Not once have I heard a company say that it has it all figured out. If all brands have these challenges, how do some companies seemingly nail the customer experience, while others struggle?

The brands that deliver compelling, connected customer experiences have one thing in common – they create an accessible, scalable view of their customer and connect that view with the right content to deliver relevant and engaging experiences across every customer interaction. Many know this, but the problem is some brands get hung up on the challenges of making this happen, while others relentlessly work through the challenges to achieve it. Adobe’s mission is to help companies address these challenges, close the gaps in customer experience and “Make Experience Your Business.”

At Adobe Summit 2016, we introduced that we’re in the era of Experience Business. Last year at Summit we launched Adobe Experience Cloud to give enterprises everything they need to deliver exceptional customer experiences. Understanding that while technologies are a huge part of building an Experience Business, brands require the balance of guidance, understanding, and enablement. To address this, our focus for Summit 2018 is on the people we refer to as Experience Makers. These are the individuals focused on transforming teams, processes and the use of technology, with the unified goal of transforming their organizations into experience-led businesses. We’ll arm Experience Makers with the strategies, tools, and insights needed to put the customer experience first and make experience their business.

One way we’re helping Experience Makers is with the launch of a new enablement program with guided learning called Experience League, to help customers get the most out of Experience Cloud. Building on our existing learning modules and trainings, Experience League helps Experience Makers assess current capabilities and map out a game plan to get where they need to be. It’s a comprehensive program designed to help you and your teams understand the best approaches to connecting systems and strategies critical in delivering compelling, consistent, and connected customer experiences.

Experience League brings together a community of experts through a new learning environment where you can get access to step by step guides for best practice strategy, integration how-to’s, on-demand training videos, and one-to-one support from experts. Members can also network with fellow Experience Makers in Experience League’s thriving community, providing a forum to discuss challenges, successes and questions with peers.

There are hundreds of guides immediately available and we will continue to add guidance and capabilities, such as certifications, learning management with progressive courses and community badging to help peers better connect with experts across the industry. The program is rich with learning and will become a major source of enablement for your teams to become Experience Makers.

Customers can sign up for Experience League today here or at the Adobe booth in the Summit Pavilion. Connect with peers and Adobe experts and come early to the pavilion to get some new Experience League-branded gear.

Introducing Experience Index

We know becoming an Experience Business is not an easy feat. To help people understand how they’re progressing as Experience Makers, we’re introducing a new benchmark for the industry that helps brands find the optimal path to the next level – Experience Index. Until now there’s been no way to accurately capture the nuance and complexity around great experiences. Experience Index helps Experience Makers understand if they’re reaching consumers in the right way, based on how consumers want to engage with digital experiences, and where work still needs to be done.

The strategy behind Experience Index encompasses understanding what experiences matter to consumers, coupled with Experience Makers’ efforts and investments in experiences. Then, we produce a score that aligns with both.

We began by surveying 1500+ consumers in the U.S. about their preferences and expectations for digital experiences. Among the findings include that U.S. consumers indicate digital experiences have a long way to go and millennials and Gen-X (25-49) are much harder to please than Gen-Z (18-24) and Boomers (50+).

At Summit we’re kicking off the second phase of the Experience Index process – surveying how Experience Makers are investing in experience. You can participate via the physical iPads located at the Adobe booth in the Summit Pavilion.

Once we score Experience Makers’ efforts and investments, we’ll compare this to consumer expectations. A scorecard will be produced for to help highlight where performance is meeting or below consumers’ expectations. This effort is in-progress, and we’ll generate Experience Index scores over the course of the next month.

As Summit day 1 kicks off, the buzz and excitement about Experience Business transformation is evident. Tune into the blog and our keynote livestream (sign up here) to hear more from Adobe and leading brands about practical, implementable advice for Experience Makers to transform their organizations into Experience Businesses.

And don’t forget to check out the Experience League and take the survey to assess your current capabilities. We look forward to continuing to help you drive toward becoming an Experience Maker.